How to use a heating calculator to get the right sized radiator

When selecting a radiator or heated towel rail for a particular room in your home, it’s very important you get one that provides the right amount of heat output for the room size. If you select a radiator that has too low a heat output, you face the problem of the room never getting up to a warm enough temperature. However, choose a radiator that is too powerful for the room and you could end up with an overly hot room as well as wasting money on excessive heating bills. To make it easy for you to get the right-sized radiator for your room, we’ve provided you with a simple heating calculator to do all the calculations for you. You’ll need to measure the height, width and length of the room you intend to put your radiator into, along with the surface area of the windows in that particular room. However, calculating the right heat output is not just about the size of the room as there are other factors to take into account. For this reason we also ask some additional questions, such as what’s above and below the target room and what type of windows you have. They’re simple questions, but along with your measurements, they enable us to give you an accurate heat output figure so you can select your rad with the confidence that it’s the right size for your room Radiator heat output is measured in British Thermal Units (BTUs) or Watts. Our heating calculator gives you figures in both of these units and we display both on our website to make it convenient for our customers to choose a radiator or towel rail. Article by Benjamin Clarke